If you have ever come across these questions, this post will be definitely helpful to you. And, yes you can create a personal blog/ website completely free of cost using one of the free blog sites/ platforms. There are many blogging platforms yet this post tells you about only the 3 most popular free blog sites.

Precisely, it’s the comparative review of the 3 best free blogging platforms which are used by millions of bloggers around the world. You will learn how to start a blog on each platform, pros, and cons which will help you to choose the most appropriate blogging platform for yourself.

Choosing a FREE blog platform – Things you should know

First of all, choosing free blog platform is an easy but a bold decision.

You don’t need to worry about setup and hosting which will be readily done for you. That’s not all you get a domain name too – all of them free of cost.

However, you cannot get a custom domain name (like mysamplesite.com) but a shared domain name (like mysamplesite.wordpress.com).

Actually, there are some limitations with free blog sites which restrict you from certain types of freedom. In actual terms, you have less control over your website, fewer customization options and you cannot monetize a blog created on free platforms.

Despite all, some of the free blogging platforms allow you to upgrade your website for professional use. You can create a custom domain name and also earn money from your blog if you are creating consistent content.

Therefore, you must choose a blogging platform according to the type of content you create now and in the future. If you think that you may want changes on your site or make it more professional, it’s good to choose a platform that allows you upgrading options.

You can have a quick look at the overall summary of the 3 free blog sites on the table below. However, it’d be better to choose one after reading the complete overview on each of them.

I’m pretty sure that you have heard enough about WordPress. It is doubtlessly the most popular blogging platform which has evolved as the most popular content management system and a powerful platform for all types of websites.

That’s not all…. WordPress is considered as the most simple and beginner-friendly platform. Anyone without coding knowledge can easily start a blog on WordPress platform.

Yet, you might get confused with two flavors of WordPress: WordPress.com and WordPress.org. In general terms, WordPress.com is fully hosted while WordPress.org is the self-hosted version which requires you to setup and host on your own. To learn more about the two forms of WordPress, read this article.

To start a blog on WordPress.org platform, you need to buy hosting and domain. There are thousands of WordPress themes free and also premium themes for this platform.

Focused on the normal users, I will discuss only WordPress.com platform here.

How to start your blog on WordPress.com?

Just hit the ‘Get Started’ button and you will come to the 1st step out of 5 steps.

Choose one of the 4 layouts provided: A list of my latest posts, A welcome page for my site, A grid of my latest posts or An online store. That’s all you do in step 1.

Step 2 – You can choose a theme. If you want to preview them, just right click on the theme you want to preview and take a look at the demo. Demo is just how your website will look.

Step 3 – It is where you can find a domain name. You will get a shared domain name like samplename.wordpress.com for free. Try out the name you want in the domain search box. If you want a custom domain name, you can still type there (You have to pay for this).

Step 4 – You can choose a hosting plan in step 4. If you choose the free plan, you will get a WordPress.com subdomain. If you want a custom domain name, you can pick any of the 3 plans available as per your need.

Step 5 – You will get a ‘Create your account’ form where you must insert your email address, username, and a password. Just hit ‘Go’.

Blogger is yet another most user-friendly free blog sites to start a blog. Blogger is super-easy as it is a Google-owned platform which was formerly known as BlogSpot. With a quick and easy integration with your Google profile, you can instantly start a new website within minutes.

How to start your blog on Blogger.com?

Creating a blog on Blogger is as easy as signing in your email. Click on ‘Create your blog’, then insert your Google email address and password.

There you go – A small pop-up window will appear where you can insert title of your blog and set an address like ‘mysampleblog.blogspot.com’. Then choose a template as per the content you want to publish: Simple, Dynamic Views, Picture Window, etc. You can change the title, address, and template later.

You are almost done with a new blog – you just need to create posts and publish them.

Click on view blog and you’ll see you blog already online. Up next, you may want to make some changes on the design of your blog. You were provided just a few templates while creating your blogger account but there are plenty of options now.

Go to ‘Template‘ option and you will see the template that is currently active on your blog. You will see how it looks on desktops and mobile devices. Just below the demo, you will find ‘customize’ and ‘edit HTML’ button for making changes on the active template. You can go for ‘Edit HTML’ option if you are HTML friendly.

Besides, you can also change the template. If you have used simple template earlier, now you can use any template from Dynamic Views, Picture Window, Watermark, Travel, etc as per your need. As you click on the template, you can preview how your blog may look like on the template. If you like, click on ‘Apply to blog’.

Furthermore, there are other easy to use options to customize your blog.

Pros:

Blogger is simple – simplicity is the best thing about this platform.

No setup required, free hosting and domain (BlogSpot.com subdomain)

Security enhanced by Google

You can earn money via Google AdSense.

Cons:

Limited options to modify and customize, limited templates

If your site grows and you want to upgrade, there are no options to upgrade – migrating to another platform is quite confusing.

You can no complete authority over your blog which is why your blog can be suspended anytime.

Less support, fewer updates and new features

Conclusion

If you want a basic, easy and simple blog without bigger future plans, it’s a perfect platform to start your personal blog.

Wix is yet another amazing blogging platform for creating stunning websites. With plenty of easy drag and drop templates and free site hosting, Wix is one of the best free blog sites to start a new blog. It is user-friendly yet it may take a while for the beginners to come through multiple features.

How to start your blog on Wix.com?

First of all, click on ‘Start Now’ which will direct you to a login page. As you are new to Wix, click on ‘Sign Up’ which you can find below ‘Log In’.

Insert your email address twice and set a password, insert it again to confirm. Now you can choose what type of website you want to create: business, designer, photography, blog, etc.

You can select blog or any other, then you will be taken to a page with two website creating options: Create with Wix ADI or Wix Editor. Wix ADI is Wix’s Artificial Design Intelligence which can create a unique design for you based on the information you provided. While Wix Editor provides drag and drop editor. As a beginner, you can select and Wix ADI and proceed.

Then, you will come across a page where you can choose your taste: minimal, clean, serene, classic, horizon or chic. That’s all, Wix ADI will do the task for you – creates your homepage.

Now you have your homepage readily designed. To add custom content and customize further, simply click on the section you want to customize and a customization box will appear on the left. Customize as you want.

Next, click on the ‘Publish’ button which the final step to go online. It has two options: FREE Wix.com domain or a customized domain. Choose the free option and your website is live now. You can view your site online and the site address looks like username.wix.com/mysamplesite.

Pros:

Beautiful designs created by Wix ADI or easy to use drag and drop site builder

Plenty of design templates available – about 500 templates available.

When your site becomes popular, you can anytime upgrade with the premium plan.

Cons:

Limited features and customization options, you cannot change the template later.

Free Wix blog shows Wix ads on your site.

You have no complete authority over your blog which is why your blog can be suspended any time.

Conclusion

Wix is a good platform for the medium-level users who have time and patience to create a website. There are a sheer number of designs available to choose from so that beginners may remain perplexed anytime. Besides, upgrading options make it ideal for business owners.

Sunita Rai

Sunita is a WordPress lover, digital marketing, SEO, and blogging enthusiast. She has appeared on ThemeGrill blog, WPAll, and multiple websites. She loves doing research, writing, travel, music and exploring life. She is a passionate learner and dreamer.
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Hi, thanks for your post. It is very informative and very easy to understand. I am not a developer or whatever it is called, and has only used Wix. I just want to ask how can you create a news site. like huffpost or similar? Thanks in advance

Wow! What a greatly detailed view! The fact that the blogging sites have been compared in such an in-depth manner here simply goes on to make it an absolutely reliable platform for bloggers to decide about the best pick.

Cannot comment on WordPress since I’ve not used them in many years. However, I just tried Wix for the first time & I was not impressed. They limit your bandwidth to 500MB a month. For most people this is not a problem, but if your blog becomes even “somewhat” popular you will be forced to pay. Though they have more creative options than Blogger, I find their page designer rather slow & cumbersome. I’ll stick with Blogger which I find faster & easier to use.

I don’t know how up-to-date this list is, but I followed the advice of many to try WordPress and was really frustrated by its limitations in the free part. You cannot embed iframes which means no Youtube, no Tweets, no Facebook posts, etc. Javascripts are also out of the question. The variety of themes is lovely of course, and if you only plan to do text or photos it is fine. Blogger does not have that flexibility in themes but it also has none of those aforementioned restrictions, so I chose it instead.

Thank you so much for sharing this article. I am currently doing some research on social media on how to drive traffic to my website on Wix. I just wasn’t sure what constituted a blog platform. You have given me the confidence that my choice to go with Wix was the best one for me.Now I can continue my research with confidence as I build up my business. Thank you!

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Awesome. I have been using wix since 2014. I think they are awesome. They maybe a bit pricey in terms of upgrading to a premium class but nevertheless, it is worth the cost. Thanks for a detailed insight.